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A Lead on the
Ark of the Covenant
When last we saw the lost Ark of the Covenant in
action, it had been dug up by Indiana Jones in Egypt and ark-napped by Nazis,
whom the Ark proceeded to incinerate amidst a tempest of terrifying
apparitions. But according to Tudor Parfitt, a real life scholar-adventurer,
Raiders of the Lost Ark had it wrong, and the Ark is actually nowhere near
Egypt. In fact, Parfitt claims he has traced it (or a replacement container for
the original Ark), to a dusty bottom shelf in a museum in Harare, Zimbabwe.
As Indiana Jones's creators understood, the Ark is one
of the Bible's holiest objects, and also one of its most maddening McGuffins. A
wooden box, roughly 4 ft. x 2 ft. x 2.5 ft., perhaps gold-plated and carried on
poles inserted into rings, it appears in the Good Book variously as the
container for the Ten Commandments (Exodus 25:16: "and thou shalt put into
the ark the testimony which I shall give thee"); the very locus of God's
earthly presence; and as a divine flamethrower that burns obstacles and also
crisps some careless Israelites. It is too holy to be placed on the ground or
touched by any but the elect. It circles Jericho behind the trumpets to bring
the walls tumbling down. The Bible last places the Ark in Solomon's temple,
which Babylonians destroyed in 586 BC. Scholars debate its current locale (if
any): under the Sphinx? Beneath Jerusalem's Temple Mount (or, to Muslims, the
Noble Sanctuary)? In France? Near London's Temple tube station?
Parfitt, 63, is a professor at the University of
London's prestigious School of Oriental and African Studies. His new book, The
Lost Ark of the Covenant: Solving the 2,500 Year Mystery of the Fabled Biblical
Ark (HarperOne) along with a History Channel special scheduled for March 2
would appear to risk a fine academic reputation on what might be called a
shaggy Ark story. But the professor has been right before, and his Ark fixation
stems from his greatest coup. In the 1980s Parfitt lived with a Southern
African clan called the Lemba, who claimed to be a lost tribe of Israel.
Colleagues laughed at him for backing the claim; in 1999, a genetic marker
specific to descendents of Judaism's Temple priests (cohens) was found to
appear as frequently among the Lemba's priestly cast as in Jews named Cohen.
The Lemba — and Parfitt — made global news....”
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